"Ice Age 2" Skates Through a Second Weekend

Fox’s big-money cash cow Ice Age: The Meltdown reigned supreme for a second consecutive weekend at the box office, fending off a few newcomers who probably made a bit more money than they deserved. Playing on nearly 4,000 screens, Meltdown made another $34.5 million (!) over the weekend, upping its grand total to an icy cool $116.4 million.

Debuting in second-place was the unscreened-for-critics and therefore-probably-stinky Sony Benchwarmers, which fielded about $20.5 million from 3,300 theaters. Dancing along in third place was the Antonio Banderas ballroomer Take the Lead, which made $12.8 million from 3,000 theaters.

Hanging on in fourth place was Universal’s Inside Man, which added another $9.2 million to its $66.1 million bank vault, while fifth place went to WeinsteinCo newcomer Lucky Number Slevin, which debuted in 2,000 theaters to the tune of $7.1 million.

Fox Searchlight’s Phat Girlz debuted with sort of a thud, grossing about $3.1 million from just over a thousand theaters.

Next weekend sees the arrival of two new wide-release entries: Disney’s animated comedy The Wild, and Dimension’s 4-hour Canadian period piece costume drama Scary Movie 4.